I know there's a solar thread and an oil thread already, but I thought this deserved its own. I just read an article, "Island in the Wind", in the recent issue of the New Yorker and I'd like to get Archinecters' reaction. It's kind of long, but interesting to read and in line with what we've been talking about on the other threads.

The article first tell about the island of Samsø in Denmark and their effort to lower carbon emissions as much as possible. The second part talks about Switzerland and the idea of the "2,000-Watt Society". I won't go into all the details, since the article explains it well, but the writer points out that a person living a 2,000-watt life would not consume, in all his/her activities, more energy than that in one year.

She points out that many countries are below that right now: India is a 1,000 watt society, and China, as of right now, is a 1,500 watt country. Switzerland is a 5,000 watt society; most other Western European countries are 6,000 watt societies; while the US and Canada are 12,000 watt countries (!!!!)